Bits & bobs

Firstly, a little food porn. After several pub meals last week, it was really good to get back to home cooking, even of the basic "homely" variety. This tasted pretty damn good. It is based on a recipe by Jeanne Lemlin, a US vegetarian cookery writer whose books I do most heartily recommend. I can't give exact sizes, quantities, times, because I don't follow them any more for this. Go with your instincts.

I used one medium cauliflower, two red onions, three medium potatoes and four small tomatoes. These get chopped in to slightly larger than bite-sized chunks and plonked into a large ovenproof casserole dish with a lid. Now throw in a long, long glug of wine or sherry (this is optional, but really helps the flavour), a big squirt of tomato puree (the original recipe was something like 1/3 cup, as was the olive oil next on the list). More of both would be quite acceptable, less would not - it is the olive oil that makes for the deep, deep flavour of this dish. Now you need somewhere around half a pint of vegetable stock (Marigold bouillon is just fine, can't be arsed to make real stock these days.) Don't add it all at once - this recipe doesn't need "gravy" just to be nice and moist. Season with plenty of freshly ground black pepper, lots of basil, almost always dried in my case, see previous post! and again in my case because I like it, nearly a teaspoonful of one of the Schwarz spice mixtures, Cajun being prime fave. Stir around merrily and put in a hot oven for at least two hours. I mean that - forget everything you have ever been told about al dente veggies, this needs to be cooked down and soft, so the flavours meld. About fifteen minutes before you want to eat, put on a topping. Until last night, this has always been breadcrumbs and cheese whizzed together in the Magimix, but no more. The recent incarnation was lots of wholemeal breadcrumbs (because we had a large heel of loaf to use up) with more basil in fairly industrial quantities, a couple of teaspoonfuls at least of tamari/soy sauce and a large handful of mixed seeds. Sprinkle this thickly over the top of the veg mixture, and put back in the oven until beginning to crisp.

We enjoyed it.

What I did on my holidays Part the second.

Not as much as I would have liked, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. First, one completed toe up sock, courtesy of an Online Guild workshop.



Nice, easy instructions, no problems in that direction. In this photo you can see the main reason for doing socks this way...yes, indeedy, the itsy bitsy length of yarn left. Otherwise.....not that impressed. Don't like the overall shape, loathe the toe, don;t think too much of the heel - what's wrong with turning heels anyway? Strange - one of the reasons that most of the other participants in the workshop liked this method was they said they could try on the sock under construction. Huh? I can try on a cuff-down, but can't get my silly foot through past the needles (could have done with two circs, but didn't rate that either.) Still, a lesson learned. Most of my objections pertain to my particular circumstances, and it is a useful way to know.

Then, started the outer bag with the Polwarth. Not that you can see all that much yet. Nice to work, but slow for some reason. Never mind, no rush.



And I did spin cotton, both on the charka and the spindle. Again, slow - there's a very long way to go.



I did some beading as well - and to that I hie me now. On a deadline - again. Just want to try something first....no yes!